OBJECTIVES To study associations between diet, respiratory symptoms and allergy among female university students in Japan. METHODS A standardised questionnaire was distributed to students in Kobe and Kamakura (N=153). Multiple logistic/linear regression was applied, controlling for age, smoking, heredity and diet. RESULTS Totally 15.7% reported doctor-diagnosed asthma, 3.3% current asthma m...

milk fat is frequently adulterated to meet the demand which exceeds the supply and to increase profit margins. samples of butter adulterated with different levels (5, 10 and 15% w/w) of margarine were prepared and analysed using different methods including refractive index, iodine, reichert-meissl and polenske values. gc and hplc were utilized to determine fatty acid and tocol profiles of sampl...

We investigated the changes of cholesterol and non-cholesterol sterol metabolism during plant stanol ester margarine feeding in 153 hypercholesterolemic subjects. Rapeseed oil (canola oil) margarine without (n = 51) and with (n = 102) stanol (2 or 3 g/day) ester was used for 1 year. Serum sterols were analyzed with gas-liquid chromatography. The latter showed a small increase in sitostanol peak...

It has been suggested that phytosterol and phytostanol esters possess similar cholesterol-lowering properties, however, whether mechanisms responsible are identical has not been addressed. To address this question, cholesterol plasma levels, absorption, biosynthesis, and turnover were measured in 15 hypercholesterolemic subjects consuming prepared diets each over 21 d using a cross-over design....

The objective of the study was to examine if exposure to extra vitamin D from food fortification was associated with a decrease in the risk of preeclampsia. The study was based on a natural experiment exploring the effect of the abolition of the Danish mandatory vitamin D fortification of margarine in 1985. The effect of the extra vitamin D (1.25μg vitamin D/100 g margarine) was examined by com...

Observational epidemiological studies have shown that low carotenoid intake and/or low carotenoid blood levels increase the risk of degenerative diseases like age-related macular degeneration. Functional foods enriched with plant sterol or stanol esters may lower serum concentrations of fat-soluble carotenoids. Theoretically, as a result the macular pigment optical density (MPOD), a marker for ...

Consumption of plant sterol- or stanol-enriched margarines by statin users results in an additional LDL-cholesterol reduction of approximately 10 %, which may be larger than the average decrease of 3-7 % achieved by doubling the statin dose. However, whether this effect persists in the long term is not known. Therefore, we examined in patients already on stable statin treatment the effects of 8...

To assess whether the type of fat ingested at breakfast can modify the plasma lipid profile and other cardiovascular risk variables in postmenopausal women at risk of cardiovascular disease, a longitudinal, randomized, and crossover study was carried out with postmenopausal women at risk of CVD. They were randomly assigned to eat each type of breakfast during one month: 6 study periods (breakfa...

We found previously that the ingestion of margarine containing medium-chain triacylglycerols (MCT) resulted in a significant increase in postprandial thermogenesis when compared with long-chain triacylglycerols (LCT). Diets that included margarine containing MCT and LCT were compared for 12 weeks in 73 subjects to investigate the effects on body weight, body fat, areas of subcutaneous and visce...